Consequences

by Muriel Bolger

Genres: Women's Fiction

Synopsis

Will what happens on holiday ... stay on holiday? And can they learn to live with the consequences? Every year, a close-knit group of friends spend two sun-filled weeks in a Spanish villa. For Derek and Sharonne, Conor and Maeve, Rory and Trish, and Liam, it's the perfect way to end the summer and escape their high-pressured lives in Dublin. No children, no responsibilities, and no distractions. This year, however, the group befriends Agneta and Anna Maria, two women holidaying in a neighbouring villa, and a series of events is set in motion that will shake the group to its very core. As the holiday comes to an end and the friends arrive home in Dublin, life appears to go back to normal. But the deceptions that began in Spain refuse to be buried and infidelities and secrets come to the surface As facades crumble, each of the friends discover who they can trust and who, ultimately, will betray them.

Release date: May 5, 2011

Publisher: Hachette Ireland

Print pages: 332

Sample

June 2006

Sharonne didn’t bother to call goodbye or wish Derek luck. She slammed the hall door behind her. He heard the screech of the
tyres as she rounded the bend in their driveway, the revving while the gates opened and then the ensuing engine roar as she
disappeared down the leafy road in their quiet Dublin suburb.


Derek had woken up as the morning sun had sliced through the wooden blinds and reached the bed. It was the day of the Captain’s
Prize and he was looking forward to an outing with his mates, Conor, Rory and Liam, who was the only bachelor among them.
They had a bet on that Derek would win today. The previous year’s event had almost been washed off with the last few players
forfeiting their chances by crying off before drowning on the fairways. The little stream that meandered through the course
– and swallowed golf balls with a vengeance – had burst its banks, leaving the eighth and tenth greens unplayable for weeks.
But today was sunny and clear skied, with no chance of the flood recurring.


‘Morning, honey,’ Derek had said to Sharonne as she came in to the kitchen. He stroked his goatee, something he did quite
subconsciously. His greeting had been returned with a grunt. His wife had changed the spelling of her name to Sharon-NE when
she’d gone into PR. She thought it would add a little air of mystique and distinguish her from all the other Sharons in the business.


‘What has you so happy?’ she’d snapped.

‘No kids. A bit of peace and quiet, the competition and all that. Aren’t you looking forward to the dinner?’

‘I suppose,’ she’d muttered. ‘I’ve a lot to do first though.’

‘Work?’ he’d asked.

‘No. Today is me time.’

‘Would you like a fry-up?’ he’d enquired, waving the frying pan in the air.

‘Don’t be ridiculous. Since when do I eat fry-ups?’

‘I suppose Conor will regale us with more tales of the shenanigans at the tribunal – he can be very funny about the goings
on there.’


‘Maeve will probably be wearing something mumsy,’ Sharonne had said by way of reply.

He hadn’t reacted.

This had become a pattern ever since Sharonne had discovered that Derek had gone out with Maeve before they’d met. True, he
still had a soft spot for Maeve, but once she had been introduced to Conor, he’d known he didn’t have a chance. That pair
had fallen for each other in a proverbial coup de foudre and they still acted like two lovebirds. The guys had met in college and kept in touch through golf.


‘Yes, something mumsy,’ Sharonne had goaded.

‘What do you mean by mumsy?’ Derek had risen to the bait, even though he’d sworn the last time that he never would again.

‘Mumsy – you know – like an earth mother in a floral duvet. Old before her time. She’ll probably turn up in a safe, floaty
thing, to cover her big thighs.’


‘She doesn’t have big thighs,’ he had exploded, no longer holding back his anger. ‘You know, I actually thought they were
your friends too, but obviously I was very wrong there.’


‘I just say what I feel. Anyway, Maeve can do no wrong in your eyes, can she?’

He had said nothing, concentrating on turning the sausages over on the pan. That was when she had flounced out, making a grand
exit.


Derek put his breakfast on a plate and sat down to eat, savouring the silence, which was rare in his houseful of women.

***

Sharonne arrived at Brush Strokes with only minutes to spare for her appointment. Hervé greeted her, scissors clipping rhythmically
in his right hand, a habit that irritated Sharonne beyond belief, but she knew she couldn’t say anything or he might take
out his artistic tantrums on her. He blew air kisses behind her ears with little popping sounds and in his best inner-Dublin,
pseudo-French accent, welcomed her and escorted her to her chair, mincing along on his high-rise heels.


‘Cherie, are we colouring, highlighting, treating, cutting – what would la belle Sharonne like today?’ Clicking the scissors
again, Hervé called one of his minions to wash ‘Madom’s’ hair, before he worked his magic.


Sharonne thought of Maeve again who, it seemed, everyone but she wanted to canonise. What she hadn’t let her husband know
was that she hated feeling threatened by Maeve. Perhaps if he’d told her about their relationship himself and not let her
find out what everyone else already knew, Sharonne would have been able to dismiss it. She’d never even known they had dated
until he confessed one New Year’s Eve. They’d been playing a truth or dare type of game after a few too many glasses of the
Widow Clicquot’s bubbles. That was what really rankled – that and the fact that Maeve and he were still really close.


Why hadn’t she been able to tell Derek that she’d do him proud tonight, that she had a knockout new outfit to wear? Was it
because she knew she was determined to give Maeve a run for her money or that she really did feel threatened by this former
girlfriend?


***

Maeve and Conor lived in a secluded, period house in Killiney. It hadn’t been their first home, but when Conor had begun his
rapid climb up the legal ladder, they had moved there a few years earlier. Much as she enjoyed her job at the clinic, Maeve
loved her weekends. She enjoyed nothing better than pottering around her garden, especially at this time of the year, when
the roses were out and the leaves were still a freshly minted green. She stopped every now and then to look down on the sea,
and today was a glorious day for doing that.


She decided to paint her nails out on the patio. She settled herself with the newspaper, the only way to stop her getting
up and pulling a weed, or doing a bit of deadheading somewhere in the beds and smudging the polish before it dried. The garden
in a way had become her baby. She listened to the birds and the sound of a neighbour’s ride-on mower doing its repetitive
circuit. This was the sort of decadently lazy Saturday that she most enjoyed. She inhaled the smell of the newly cut grass
wafting from the other side of the hedge and wondered how Conor was playing. Maybe he’d take the prize again this year. I
must ring Trish, she thought, but her phone buzzed on the table at that moment.


‘Hi, Trish, I was just thinking about you,’ said Maeve. She’d been friends with Trish since schooldays and when Maeve had
started going out with Conor, he had introduced Trish to Rory and it hadn’t been long before they’d become an item.


‘Well, that’s telepathy for you. Have you a new gúna for the do tonight?’ Trish asked.

‘I have,’ said Maeve. ‘What about you?’

‘I’ve just gone mad and splurged. I bought new shoes too. I daren’t tell Rory what I spent so I threw the receipts away! He’d
go mad if he knew how much they cost. You know what he’s like, always going on about saving the pennies.’


Maeve did. She and Conor often talked about Rory’s stinginess and he’d told her that the guys in the golf club were saying
the previous week that he’d never allow himself to win the Captain’s Prize because he’d have to buy the drinks afterwards.


‘Is Liam bringing anyone to the dinner?’ Maeve asked.

‘Not that I heard, but you never know with him – always full of surprises.’

‘Right, I have to fly, have to pick the kids up from the tennis club. See you later.’

***

As always, it was chaotic in the Collins’ household in Glenageary and this evening was no exception. Rory had come home, very
happy with his round of golf. Trish’s niece had arrived to baby-sit. Their eldest son, Barry, at almost sixteen, was at an
age where he felt offended by such an indignity and argued that he was old enough to be in charge. That was what worried Rory
and Trish – he was old enough – old enough to have some pals in and to visit the drinks cupboard. They’d been told tales of
this happening from his school – of kids topping up the gin and vodka bottles with water after they had had their fill and
Trish was adamant that it wouldn’t happen in their home. Louise and Toni, their other two children, loved having their cousin
over. She was in her final year at school and was ‘cool’ in their eyes. She gave them French manicures and showed them how
to use make-up.


‘Everything Liam touches seems to turn to gold these days,’ Rory said when they were getting ready to go out.

‘What makes you say that?’

‘He’s just landed another hotel development – with a new client in Cyprus – five star all the way.’

‘Well, that’s great, isn’t it? I mean – he works really hard,’ she said.

‘We all work really hard.’

‘You know that’s not what I meant. You can’t complain. You have some nice contracts on the books too and Liam has no commitments,
no kids or school fees, no mortgages, no wife …’


‘I’m not about to give her up,’ he said as she disappeared into the bathroom.


‘Good,’ she called out.

He followed her into the bathroom.

‘You know, I’ve just been thinking, there’s Derek with his finger in the Palm Island development in Dubai and a new bank headquarters
in the Dublin Docklands. Maybe I should have expanded abroad more.’


‘I don’t think so – and leave me with those three downstairs.’ She laughed. ‘We’re doing fine as we are.’

Rory was doing well. He owned his own highly successful architectural practice and with the way the construction industry
was booming and running away with itself, there were good times ahead for all of them, despite the fact that one or two economists
were saying the bubble would burst sooner rather than later. He was making sure he’d salted away enough just in case.


‘You better get a move on Rory, or the taxi’ll be here,’ Trish said. The surfaces around her sink were scattered with makeup
as she stood in front of her mirror. Rory’s side was free of everything except his aftershave. She was wearing an open wrap
over her black underwear.


‘I hate these strapless bras, I always feel I’m going to fall out of them,’ she said, tugging it up higher.

‘Need any help?’ asked Rory, putting his arms around her and nuzzling her.

‘Not the kind you have in mind, not now anyway,’ she said, ‘Maybe later …’

‘Aha, I’m on a promise …’ he said doing up his bowtie.

Trish went back to their bedroom and slipped on her dress.

‘You look terrific,’ her husband said.

‘Thank you – and I feel it too.’

***

‘Perfect timing,’ said Derek. ‘There’s Maeve and Conor in front of us. Derek was taking money from his wallet when Sharonne shrieked.


‘My God, I’m not going in there! Look at her – look at what she’s wearing,’ she said grabbing hold of his arm.

‘She looks terrific,’ said Derek.

‘She looks terrific!’ echoed Sharonne.

‘Don’t say you’re going to throw one of your tantrums. You both look great.’ He tried a recovery but it drove Sharonne into
an even greater rage.


‘Look at her will you, you blind fool. She’s wearing my outfit.’

‘For Christ’s sake get a grip. Pretend you don’t notice. It’s only a dress and it doesn’t look the same to me. It’s not even
the same colour. Yours is purple.’


‘It’s burgundy, not purple,’ she said irrationally, ‘and I’m going home. I have to change.’

‘For once, will you realise the world doesn’t revolve around you. What would you tell a client to do if this happened to them?’

She gave him a withering look. ‘I’m not a client and I’m going home.’

‘If you want to go that’s your call. I’m not going with you. Could you not try, for my sake, to be … nice?’

‘If you go in there without me, you needn’t expect me to come back.’

‘Fine! I won’t. I’m going to enjoy myself.’

‘As if I bloody well care.’

The taxi man kept his eyes straight ahead.

‘Oh honey, don’t I just know that? Thank you for asking me how I played. It’s the first time I’ve ever won the Captain’s Prize.
Thanks for your support, but I’m not going to let you spoil tonight because of your insane jealously of Maeve.’


Conor approached. ‘Hi there, you two.’

Derek got out of the taxi.

‘Sharonne’s having one of her petulant moments,’ he said, shooting a menacing look back at his wife, who was still in the car. ‘She’s deciding whether or not to grace us with her presence.’


Conor laughed. ‘Grace us with her presence? Umm. It can’t be that bad?’ he said. ‘And you know I don’t handle divorce cases.’

‘Well that could all change and this could be your first,’ he said. ‘It seems our wives are wearing similar dresses. And mine
is not very happy with the situation.’ He took a note from his wallet and handed it to the driver.


‘That’s not sufficient grounds for another world war, is it?’ asked Conor.

‘Maybe not in global terms but, in the world of Sharonne, it seems to be of nuclear proportions.’ Derek went over to Maeve.

‘You look stunning, as always,’ he said, hugging her warmly. ‘And,’ he whispered, ‘Sharonne’s on the warpath – be prepared!’

‘I hear congratulations are in order,’ Maeve said while Conor was coaxing Sharonne out of the car.

‘Snap, Sharonne,’ said Maeve, ‘I see we’ve been shopping in the same place. I only hope I look as good in this as you do.’

Sharonne could hardly speak with anger. ‘Now that I see it on you, I’m not sure I really like the cut,’ was her reply.

‘Come on, let’s get you ladies inside for a drink,’ Conor said.

They headed upstairs to the bar, which overlooked the eighteenth green. It was a blissful summer’s evening and they took their
cocktails out onto the veranda where Rory and Trish were already sitting.


‘I’m really looking forward to the holiday in Mijas,’ Maeve said to Trish, referring to the two-week holiday the friends took
together every summer. ‘I can’t wait either,’ Trish replied. ‘Hey look, here’s Liam – with a stunner. I told you he’d surprise
us.’ They all laughed.


Liam had a striking-looking girl by his side, one they hadn’t met before. She stretched out her hand to Maeve and said, ‘I’m Noelle, and I don’t play golf.’


Liam said, ‘That sounds like a confession. “Hello, I’m Liam and I’m a gambler or a serial womaniser or some such.”’

‘Well, it is in a way, because my parents, three brothers and two sisters-in-law all play and when any of them get together my eyes are
inclined to glaze over. So I just thought I should warn you that if that happens I don’t need medication, just a change of
topic!’


Sharonne chimed, ‘Mine will probably glaze over before yours,’ before adding, ‘with boredom.’

Liam interrupted, ‘Now Shar, we’re not that dull.’ He went on, unaware of the reason for Sharonne’s bad temper. ‘We can always
talk about things like who’s fleecing who in the seedy world of finance that you represent.’ She shot him a filthy look, glanced
at her watch and asked, ‘Will they never get on with speeches?’


Noelle turned to Trish, ‘That dress is a stunner. I wish I could wear black.’

Sharonne butted in, ‘There’s so much of it here this evening it’s hard to tell who’s serving staff and who isn’t.’

Trish smiled sweetly at her and said, ‘Well, I’m not on duty tonight, so you can rule me out!’ Her one-shoulder black dress
fitted her like a second skin. She didn’t usually buy designer labels and was the envy of many of her friends as she always
had the knack of knowing what to buy, whether from a chain or department store.


Maeve said, ‘You do look fantastic, Trish. That was worth every penny.’

Trish replied, ‘When I saw it in the boutique in Donnybrook, I decided I was going to splurge. I dipped into my running away
money to buy it. Designer dresses don’t fit into any of Rory’s accounting systems so I’ll have to pretend it came from Next.’


Derek was the centre of attention with club members coming up to congratulate him on his win. Sharonne did her public relations bit of smiling and being nice to them all, but her smile never reached her eyes and took on a frozen look as Derek
made his acceptance speech. He finished it up by saying, ‘We were all getting worried that Conor might make it three in a
row and feared that the only way we would be able to stop him would be to vote for him to be vice captain, but with so many
builders in the club that may not have been an easy vote to get passed!’


There was laughter all around. Everyone knew that the developers were the ones being investigated in the tribunals and some
of them there that evening might yet end up in the witness box being cross-examined by Conor.


Derek went back to the table amid guffaws and wisecracks. He was a popular winner. He was a good sportsman, good at tennis,
had played rugby for his school and college and run a few marathons in his time, yet he was never fanatical about anything
only his work. Sharonne clapped half-heartedly but with no evidence of delight as she watched Maeve show real pleasure at
his victory. She didn’t sit beside him at the table, or beside Maeve, and as soon as the soup was served she feigned a migraine,
excused herself and went to ask the barman to call a taxi. When she joined the table again she turned on Maeve, ‘You should
do something with your hair. Maybe lighten it a bit to give it a lift. I could give you the number of the guy who does mine
– he’s great at shaping.’


Trish and Rory exchanged looks and Trish stretched her foot under the table kicking Maeve not to react, while she said pointedly,
‘Don’t you dare go blonde. You’re not old enough to do that yet. Look around here. It’s like a Barbie reunion.’


‘… a Barbie reunion,’ echoed Conor.

‘Now that you mention it, it could be,’ laughed Liam, ‘Not old enough to go blonde – I like that.’

‘What do you mean old enough?’ Sharonne rounded on him.

‘Well, all my mother’s friends who got tired of trying to hide the grey roots turned blonde in their old age. Talk about the
Golden Girls – they called themselves the Flaxen Floozies!’


‘They didn’t!’ said Noelle.

‘They did. They had the X factor all right – Botox, detox and intox, the highlights in their lives. It was all Auntie Anne’s
fault. She came home after living for years in the States with all these crazes and the others followed suit. Well, she’d
had three husbands and confessed to a few lovers too, so they felt she knew something they didn’t, scandalised and all as
they were by her.’


Before Sharonne could make any further comment, a waiter signalled the arrival of her taxi. Her parting shot to Derek was,
‘Well, you enjoy your evening.’


‘Oh, I will. Now,’ he muttered to himself, getting up and walking her to the door. ‘Don’t wait up for me. It’ll be a late
one.’


Astounded at her bitchiness and knowing full well there was no migraine, Noelle asked, ‘I couldn’t help but notice that you
are wearing the same dresses. Is that what that was all about?’


‘Apparently so,’ Liam replied before Trish could. ‘She has her moments and sometimes it doesn’t take too much to trigger them!’
The guys all felt sorry for Derek.


‘No glazed eyes tonight, then?’ Trish asked.

Noelle laughed, ‘I might have been missing out if club nights are all like this.’

‘Happily they’re not.’

‘What a bitch. Men have left their wives for less!’ Conor muttered to Maeve.

Derek came back to the table and, as he passed by Maeve’s chair he ended everyone’s awkwardness about the situation when he
stopped and said, ‘Now more wine anyone? This is supposed to be a celebration.’


Although conversations started up again Derek knew Sharonne had gone one step too far. He and the men were all dressed identically
in black suits and bowties and they weren’t running home to change. What was the big deal anyway? But he knew that it hadn’t just been the dress that had rankled with her.


***

When Derek got home that night, Sharonne was fast asleep, or pretending to be. He stood looking at her comatose form and realised
he didn’t like her much any more. When had this happened, he wondered, this change of heart? They used to be so good together.
He acknowledged that their activities in the bedroom had become too metred, like everything else in her life. He was not accommodated
when she wasn’t in the mood. Accommodated. Had it really come to this, that he found himself looking at his wife and thinking
words like that? No, he decided, I’ve had enough of this. He went to one of the guest bedrooms, undressed, climbed beneath
the duvet and lay thinking. Sleep was a long way off as he reflected on their friends and their lifestyles. If she kept up
this behaviour, it would make things very awkward when it came to the holiday in a few weeks time.


He knew that Sharonne was a high-maintenance woman. She hadn’t ever wanted children either. She used to say women never looked
the same after they’d been stretched. Derek had been thrilled when she’d become pregnant. She hadn’t been – she’d freaked.
She hadn’t missed taking her contraceptive pill, she’d assured him of that. But she had had a violent reaction to mussels
after a meal one weekend and had been sick for a few days. ‘That’s what did it,’ the doctor told Derek, ‘the food poisoning
and the retching had the effect of rendering the dosage ineffective for a short period, and so your wife is pregnant.’


‘It’s good to have your family when you’re young,’ the doctor said after he’d broken the news to them that they were going
to have not one, but two. ‘So many women are waiting until well into their thirties before starting.’


‘At least I’ll get it all over with in one fell swoop,’ had been Sharonne’s reaction to the news. ‘I wouldn’t like to have
an only child, like me, and would have felt pressured to have a second one. I always felt responsible for my parents. If they were arguing, I felt it was my fault and when they were old,
I had no one to share the visits and the anxieties with. I even felt guilty for wanting to travel, I felt like I was abandoning
them.’


‘So twins seem like a perfect solution for you,’ the doctor had said to them. ‘They can gang up on you when they are teenagers.’

Derek hadn’t really been surprised when she’d told the obstetrician then, ‘When you’re delivering them you can tie my tubes
too?’


‘Isn’t that a little extreme?’ Derek had asked. ‘You might change your mind later on.’

‘I won’t,’ had been her resolute reply.

She was a good mother to Megan and Sandy, Derek conceded. Much as he was annoyed with Sharonne, he knew that neither one of
them would do anything to rattle the girls’ lives.


‘I’m off now, Conor,’ Maeve said as she gathered her keys and bag.


‘Is it not a bit on the early side for you?’ he asked.

‘I want to get in before the new patients and they seem to arrive earlier and earlier on Mondays, especially when they are
coming from the country,’ she said.


‘They probably all listen to AA Roadwatch and are terrified of being caught in a traffic jam so they set out at the crack
of dawn.’


‘Probably, but they don’t feel so lost when there’s someone there to greet them.’

Maeve worked at a private clinic, as receptionist to a consultant oncologist who was much in demand for his vanguard approach
to cancer.


From her office window, she enjoyed a view across Dublin Bay to Howth, a view interrupted only by a passing train. In summer,
the sea was dotted with yachts from the numerous clubs that delineated the wealthier suburbs of the city. This morning the
tide was out, and she was sitting staring, unseeing, when Stan Rosenthal came in behind her.


‘Morning, Maeve. Had a good weekend?’

‘Yes, and you? How did the game go on Saturday?’ Stan was a member in a different club to her husband, but they often played in the Opens at each other’s courses.


‘Good. I hear Derek pipped Conor at the last hole. About time he let someone else win that trophy,’ he joked.

‘You’ve been listening to gossip,’ Maeve said.

‘Never!’ he laughed. ‘But I played with Liam yesterday and he was telling me. Heard about the ding-dong at the dinner too.
Must have been a good night.’


‘Memorable,’ said Maeve.

‘I don’t know how he stays married to that woman, or how he plays golf with a frozen shoulder.’

‘I didn’t know he had a frozen shoulder,’ she said.

‘Well, wouldn’t you have if you had to sleep with that frosty face at your back every night?’ Stan quipped.

‘That’s terrible,’ she laughed.

‘Just true,’ he answered. ‘At times like these, I’m delighted to be single again. Breda did me a favour by leaving before
I had to take that step. And I’m glad that, despite your best efforts, I’m still in that happy single state. Having my work
as my wife is a much better solution for me!’


He ducked from her mock punch. Everyone knew what Breda, or Chandeliers, was like. They called her that because she seemed
to live her life going from one glittering do to another, always dripping in bling – real and fake together.


No man was safe in her presence, even with a wife or girlfriend on his arm. Since their very public divorce she’d appeared
regularly in the gossip columns at some society bash or other and she seemed to have a penchant for dark-eyed, Arab-type escorts.
When any of their friends ran in to her it was to have to endure a litany of, ‘I was at dinner in the Egyptian embassy last
week and the ambassador told me …’ or ‘the attaché, you know he’s single, asked me to be his hostess at their national day
party …’


‘Do you know what she’s up to now?’ Stan asked. ‘She’s recently got involved in a charity for Palestinian orphans or a rescue effort for child camel jockeys or some such good cause. She seems to think this will be her social entrée into the
foreign service circle,’ he laughed. ‘Now all she talks about is, “When I was staying in the Irish embassy during the Dubai
Classic this year … or wherever.’


Maeve was thinking that this sounded just like her. She knew Breda well.

‘I hate to admit to it,’ Stan continued, ‘but my mother was right about her, you know. She always said Breda was more in love
with the idea of being married to a surgeon than with this particular surgeon. I should have listened to her! Oh hell and
damnation. Has it come to this? I never thought I’d say that about my mother. I think it’s time I got back to work.’


He grinned as he picked up the files Maeve had left on the edge of her desk earlier and took them into his consulting room
just as the first patient arrived.


The morning seemed to drag, which was unusual. Normally it was over without Maeve noticing. She felt tired and thought that
she must be getting old, late nights never used to affect her like this.


As Stan, her boss, was operating in another hospital that afternoon, Maeve finished her paperwork early and decided to call
in to Trish on her way home. She rang and told her to put the kettle on, promising to bring some Danish pastries.


When Trish opened the door she teased, ‘Oh, Maeve – that hair – you should do something about it. I see you haven’t been to
the studio yet!’ They fell around the place laughing.


‘Hervé will be so-oooo disappointed.’

‘Poor Derek. I felt so sorry for him,’ Trish said. ‘How does he put up with her? She was furious about the dress, which really
was fabulous by the way, and that’s all that was wrong with her. But you’d think she’d have the cop on to hide it.’


‘She doesn’t realise how lucky she is, with a successful business, those gorgeous girls and a good husband,’ Maeve. . .